"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
Welcome to my first steps. And some of my second, third and fourth steps. This blog started out as a place for all of me to explore, but over time my inner foodie has claimed it for herself. She's since been given a home at http://myediblejourney.wordpress.com. Slowly my inner everything else will reclaim this blog.
"The point of the journey is not to arrive." ~Rush

Friday, February 4, 2011

Soup Therapy

So after a dud blizzard that produced more snow after it was declared officially over and gave us a snow day for hubby mid-week and a lot of cold whiteness, I wanted something comforting and colourful for this weekend. The only condition is that it must be made from what I already have on hand.

Scanning my fridge, I see beets and butternut squash. Hmm, seems to me I've seen those ingredients used together recently, and not in some strange salad with Thai chili paste. Where was that recipe? Oh yes! Over at Dinner With Julie! Recently she posted a recipe for a Roasted Beet and Butternut Squash Soup that sounds like it will fit the bill nicely.

Oh, it calls for orange juice. Hmmm, I have none. But I have blood oranges. Those should work nicely. It also calls for chicken or veg stock. I have beef broth. Not going to work. So I'm currently roasting the beets and squash while simmering some veggies for stock. I may even toast the squash seeds later for a nice snack.

After a week of all of us being sick to some degree (the kids bearing the brunt of it) and wonky eating habits all around, it's nice to be planning a meal. I can tell you, there has been a lot of "breakfast for supper" happening around here. And by that, I mean cut up fruit and bowls of dry cereal. I'm a firm believer in the ability of the body to let us know what it needs or can handle while sick, and the kids have largely only wanted these very simple things. Finally the other night they ate some veg chili. Tonight we'll have pork chops. We're on the mend.

And it feels good to be cooking again. To smell stock simmering, to be mindlessly peeling and dicing vegetables, to be roasting squash and beets. There is something therapeutic in cooking. Even more in going beyond just preparing food to creating nourishment for loved ones. Last night I'll admit it, I heated up chicken nuggets and french fries (never claimed to be perfect LOL). Technically I guess I cooked them. Kind of. But making this soup is truly doing me some good. I'm making something that's filling the house with a lovely, comforting, homey smell. Something that will fill our fridge with a few meals. Something that will fill our bodies with all manner of wonderfully healthy things to nourish us. Sometimes I wonder if there's almost as much healing in the preparation of some meals as in the eating of them.